Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee • Hacker News Board

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#91

Post by reuven » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 5:30 PM UTC

How about freelancing? I've been doing that since 1995 -- and my income and happiness have never been higher.

Pros: - Work on what you like, with the people you like - Potentially very high salary, definitely more than you would get as an employee - Want to work on side projects (e.g., software, books, and courses)? Go for it, and benefit from multiple income streams.

Cons: - You're running a business. That requires time, as well as skills/knowledge (often learned the hard way) that are completely separate from programming. - You have to market yourself (until you're good enough that people contact you). No marketing, no work. No work, no salary. - It's harder to do when you're married and have children. (I started when I was single.)

In many ways, freelancing is like the "founder" described in the article. However, the article also talks about teammates and a financial plan (including funding). Plenty of successful freelancers make good money just by themselves (or maybe 1-2 junior people). And I definitely never intend to take investment money.

Not everyone is cut out to be a freelancer. But it's a very viable option, beyond being a founder, executive, or employee. And I can tell you that many of the founders, executives, and employees I meet as I travel the world teaching Python are quite jealous of my satisfaction.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#92

Post by dceddia » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 5:30 PM UTC

nichochar wrote: post #42

This is rather true in practice, but I find it tremendously depressing. I have found that the executive path is actually the one that most of the scumbags take, it is the one that attracts the most people, and those people are usually not likable, they're salespeople that sell themselves all day. The third group, the one that actually creates value, is accurately represented as not as successful both in terms of mone…

There's a good book I read recently called Developer Hegemony, and I think you might like it.

It breaks down the archetypes within companies, talks about what it takes to succeed as an employee or an executive, and then discusses an alternative route that we software engineers might be able to take.

Here's a blog about the book [0] and the book itself [1].

[0]: https://www.daedtech.com/developer-hegemony-the-crazy-idea-t...

[1]: https://leanpub.com/developerhegemony

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#93

Post by ivanjovanovic » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 5:30 PM UTC

nichochar wrote: post #42

This is rather true in practice, but I find it tremendously depressing. I have found that the executive path is actually the one that most of the scumbags take, it is the one that attracts the most people, and those people are usually not likable, they're salespeople that sell themselves all day. The third group, the one that actually creates value, is accurately represented as not as successful both in terms of mone…

I overall agree with your sentiment.

I would though not agree fully about where you assume value is created. Usually, developers / middle managers do not create value. Mostly they are implementing ideas of others and in these ideas is most of value concentrated. I would say they deliver value but don't create most of it.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#94

Post by fny » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 5:32 PM UTC

nightski wrote: post #85

mahyarm wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

80k* %50 = 40k vs. 160k * %35 = 56k Bay area in a nutshell. You can have higher savings rates too, I do around %40 and I could save even more. Working at a startup does make it harder, usually it's better to work at FANG. You also learn a lot and realize the difference between 'facebook does this dev practice because it's huge so it has to vs. it's the better practice'

Or you know, you don't have to be average and can do 300k * 60% consulting or doing some other slightly more ambitious method while still not living in the bay area.

By argument above, you'd still expect to make significantly more in the Bay Area.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#95

Post by krat0sprakhar » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 5:32 PM UTC

koolba wrote: post #51

Regardless of which path you'd like to go down, learn some basic financial planning, frugality, and learn to live like a miser. It'll pay dividends, both figuratively and literally. Regarding the executive path, or more generally any management role, learn early on if it's for you. If you're the type that gets caught up in human interest stories, considers it inhumane to fire low performers, or generally believes in…

For someone who recently graduated and quite clueless about financial planning, do you have some resources to get started?

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#96

Post by xiaosun » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 5:32 PM UTC

mmm94720 wrote: post #34

hellbreaker wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I keep on hearing about that.. so what's savings rate people should expect in SF?

Let me describe a typical mid-career Silicon Valley salaried tech worker scenario. YMMV of course. Base comp 200K Bonus, stock, 401k match 50K Total gross comp 250K Expenses: Taxes 40% (30% fed, 10% state) 100K Rental housing 40K ($3300/month) Food 15K Transportation 15K Discretionary spending 20K Total expenses 190K As a result, you can comfortably save $60K per year. Of course, kids and housing options will add gre…

How do you spend $41/day on food and another $41/day on transportation? That's pretty ridiculous budgeting...

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#97

Post by nkrisc » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 5:32 PM UTC

NikolaeVarius wrote: post #21

autotune wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> fancy apartment Being a 400 sq. ft. studio that you pay $3k per month for to live in an area where you won't get stabbed when you go out at night and is close enough to work where you don't need a car.

Why would you ever live in a studio if you want to save money?

Um, what's cheaper than a studio? Anything with one or more bedrooms is going to be more expensive.

Perhaps you're not familiar with American apartment terminology or I'm missing something? A studio apartment is as cheap as you can get normally.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#98

Post by twright0 » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 5:35 PM UTC

alexandercrohde wrote: post #36

autotune wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> fancy apartment Being a 400 sq. ft. studio that you pay $3k per month for to live in an area where you won't get stabbed when you go out at night and is close enough to work where you don't need a car.

Just for comparison, I lived in SF for about 4 years. I saved a huge amount of money. I lived with 3 roommates to save money, I sold my car, you won't get stabbed anywhere in SF (so live in the sketchy area it'll get nicer each year). My rent was $1,200 a month, a lucky find. Now don't get me wrong I hated living there, no girls, homelessness everywhere smelled like garbage, and a self-obsession that pretended to be…

> you won't get stabbed anywhere in SF (so live in the sketchy area it'll get nicer each year)

This is flatly untrue and bad advice - there are absolutely areas of San Francisco where you run the risk of being the victim of physical violence. Some people will be comfortable living in that kind of environment but many won't, and suggesting that all of San Francisco is uniformly safe is irresponsible.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#99

Post by bpchaps » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 5:36 PM UTC

gxs wrote: post #54

ryandrake wrote: post #7

> Often times there are hard barriers preventing people from starting a company. In these cases my best advice is to move to a tech hub (preferably the Bay Area) and work for a tech company until you can save the money I had to laugh there. Moving to the Bay Area will reduce your ability to save money, not increase it. I was probably saving 40-50% of my salary when I worked in Nowhereville, Florida. With the housing…

This is an insult to the thousands of people who make it in the bay area on barista wages. Just fucking wow. You can save in the bay area, live with roommates and pay comfortably . You don't even have to do that forever, just long enough to move up a bit in your job and save for a downpayment if buying a home is your goal. Not to mention if your spouse works and makes similar money then you can live a really high qua…

A SF barista makes 18k/yr. Can they make it on that? Sure. But when a third of your salary is on food - based on your quote - it's not going to be comfortable and saving is a stretch to say the least. Especially with student loans and such.

Re: Three Paths in the Tech Industry: Founder, Executive, or Employee

#100

Post by austenallred » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 5:37 PM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #7

> Often times there are hard barriers preventing people from starting a company. In these cases my best advice is to move to a tech hub (preferably the Bay Area) and work for a tech company until you can save the money I had to laugh there. Moving to the Bay Area will reduce your ability to save money, not increase it. I was probably saving 40-50% of my salary when I worked in Nowhereville, Florida. With the housing…

I don’t think the purpose of moving to the Bay Area in this sentence is to save more money. It’s to get connected and plugged into the scene.

For what it’s worth I did exactly that - moved to the SF Bay Area, started saving (you can still do it if you don’t have debt), and those connections and that experience really matter. I don’t think we could have gotten into YC without them.